Easily transportable devices with wireless telecommunications capabilities, such as mobile telephones, personal digital assistants, handheld computers, and similar devices, will be referred to herein as user equipment (UE). The term “user equipment” may refer to a device and its associated Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC) that includes a Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) application, a Universal Subscriber Identity Module (USIM) application, or a Removable User Identity Module (R-UIM) application or may refer to the device itself without such a card. A UE might communicate with a second UE, some other element in a telecommunications network, an automated computing device such as a server computer, or some other device, any of which can be referred to as another system. A communications connection between a UE and other systems might promote a voice call, a file transfer, or some other type of data exchange, any of which can be referred to as a call or a session.
As telecommunications technology has evolved, more advanced network access equipment has been introduced that can provide services that were not possible previously. This advanced network access equipment might include, for example, an enhanced node B (ENB) rather than a base station or other systems and devices that are more highly evolved than the equivalent equipment in a traditional wireless telecommunications system. Such advanced or next generation equipment may be referred to herein as long-term evolution (LTE) equipment.
Some UEs have the capability to communicate in a packet switched mode, wherein a data stream representing a portion of a call or session is divided into packets that are given unique identifiers. The packets might then be transmitted from a source to a destination along different paths and might arrive at the destination at different times. Upon reaching the destination, the packets are reassembled into their original sequence based on the identifiers. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a well-known system for packet switched based telephone communication over the Internet. The term “VoIP” will refer herein to any packet switched call connected via the Internet, regardless of the specific technology that might be used to make the call.
For a wireless VoIP call, the signal that carries data between a UE and an ENB can have a specific set of frequency and time parameters and other characteristics that might be specified by the ENB. A connection between a UE and an ENB that has a specific set of such characteristics can be referred to as a resource. An ENB typically establishes a different resource for each UE with which it is communicating at any particular time.